


Fix

by KatScratches



Series: Compulsions [2]
Category: Lost
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2015-05-08
Packaged: 2018-03-29 13:16:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3897742
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KatScratches/pseuds/KatScratches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes you find what you need in unexpected places.  Set immediately after the S2 ep "Fire + Water".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fix

**Author's Note:**

> This is not a new fic, but one I've not posted here before.

**Fix**

 

Charlie surfaces from sleep to the slow melodic thunder of surf, momentarily forgetting that he’s not on holiday at some idyllic and hideously expensive resort. And even as the world around him pulls gradually into auditory focus, he keeps his eyes tightly closed, clinging to the illusion. 

_When I open my eyes_ , he thinks, _I’ll be lying on a white deck chair with a chilled bottle of champagne and a lovely, adoring, bikini-clad lady by my side. My mobile will ring, and it’ll be Liam, telling me he’s reconsidered. He’ll tell me how Driveshaft is getting back together, and that they can’t possibly do it without me._

Off in the distance, he can hear a high, tinkling laugh, punctuated by faint animated chatter. Charlie inhales slow, deep breaths, his nostrils full of the clean scent of salt water. Inhales again.  _Please._  A third time.  _Make it be true._  And a fourth.

Finally he opens his eyes. 

No champagne. No lovely lady by his side. And certainly no ringing mobile. There’s just endless sea and sand and a sharp rock jabbing uncomfortably into the small of his back.

_Still on the bloody island of doom, then. Bollocks._

He reaches one hand up to gingerly pat at the left side of his face where Locke had hit him. The skin there feels raw and abused, the immediate area around the stitches tender and sore. His fingers come away with a sticky smear of blood, which makes Charlie infinitely grateful that he hasn’t got a mirror handy.

”So how’s it feel?” 

Charlie starts at the sound of Sawyer’s voice, flinches as the man‘s shadow falls across him. How does  _what_  feel? His bloody cheek? Being rather spectacularly shunned and outcast? The horrible, crawling itch that still occasionally haunts him from heroin withdrawal? This bloody rock poking him insistently in the spine? “How does  _what_  feel?” he finally spits out, though speaking is painful at best, his wounded cheek flaring in agony as his jaw muscles flex beneath it.

Sawyer squats down next to him in the sand, gazing at Charlie with an unreadable expression. Charlie pointedly ignores him, sitting up and pulling his hoodie as far forward as he can to hide his injured face. He isn’t much in the mood to talk; in fact, he rather wishes that Sawyer would just bugger off and harass Kate or Jack or Hurley or pretty well anyone but him. 

At last Sawyer says, “How’s it feel to take my place as public enemy number one?” 

Charlie can’t help himself and glances sharply up at Sawyer, who is watching him with what Charlie can only think of as amused sympathy. 

”Oh, come on now, amigo,” Sawyer continues as Charlie looks away again. “It was bound to happen.” 

Charlie studiously ignores him, focusing his gaze on the lazy roll of the waves. Bound to happen? What the bloody hell was  _that_  supposed to mean? He’ d not hurt anyone; he’ d only been trying to protect Aaron. Anyone with eyes could see that, couldn’t they? He’d only done what he’d believed right. Never mind that his methods might be looked on as dodgy. Never mind that no one was showing the least bit of interest in Charlie’s side of the story. Never mind that Locke --  _cocksucking bald git_ , Charlie thinks viciously -- has likely told everyone and their dog by now that Charlie was using again.

“Which I’m not,” he mutters. “I’m  _not_.” 

“What’s that, Elvis?” 

Charlie’s head jerks up. He’s actually forgotten that Sawyer was there. “What d’you want, anyway?” he snaps peevishly. “Shouldn’t you be off polishing your gun or something?” 

Sawyer chuckles. “Now  _there’s_  a new euphemism.” 

”What?” Charlie says, confused, and then all at once he gets it, and has to suddenly will himself to not picture Sawyer naked, his head thrown back in ecstasy, doing just that. “Oh.  _Oh_. No, I didn’t mean…” He stops, flustered, as Sawyer roars with laughter. 

”Very nice,” Charlie grumbles. “You know, I do have better things to do than to sit here and listen to this.”

”Oh, what’ve you got to do?” Sawyer says, eyes twinkling. “Polish  _your_  gun?” He collapses backwards onto the sand next to Charlie, helpless with laughter.

”Nice you can have a laugh at my bloody expense,” Charlie says sourly. “Glad I could be so accommodating. Now, could you kindly  _piss off?_ ” 

Sawyer leans back on his elbows and grins at Charlie. Stretched out so languorously in the sand like that, fringe falling into his twinkling eyes, he looks rather debauched. It’s very distracting, this careless sprawl, and Charlie has a sudden urge to place his trembling hand on the rough stubble of Sawyer’s jaw. He doesn’t, though, but sullenly adds, “I’m not, y’know. Using. I’m not.” 

”Never said you were.” 

It isn’t that Charlie doesn’t  _want_  a fix, but rather that he doesn’t dare. But what would be the difference, when the other castaways all think he is anyway? He’s already lost nearly everything that matters to him in this godforsaken place -- Claire, Aaron, all the tentative friendships and footholds he’s made -- everything but the music, and even that’s been trying to abandon him these last few days. He supposes Jack has sent Sawyer to check on him, as if Charlie were some fragile bit of glass wrapped up in a twist of cellophane.  _Poor little Charlie_ , he thinks bitterly.  _Handle with care._

”Jack sent you, yeah?” 

Sawyer pushes himself back up until he’s sitting right next to Charlie. “Yeah,” he says slowly. “You’d think that, wouldn’t you? But no, I’m actually here of my own free will.” His voice drops a fraction as he leans in close enough that Charlie can smell him. Sawyer smells like cigarettes and faint sweat, like warm sand, like cool seawater, and Charlie is suddenly, horribly sure that Sawyer can’t possibly miss the daunting, desperate want coming off him in waves. 

”I’m magnanimous like that,” Sawyer grins.

Charlie closes his eyes. Inhale. Exhale.  _Warm sand,_  he thinks. Inhale.  _Cool seawater_. Exhale. 

”What do you miss?” Sawyer’s breath ghosts across Charlie ear, his voice now so low and husky that it seems to come from everywhere, from the beach itself. “About the outside,” Sawyer continues. His lips are a fraction of an inch away from Charlie’s jaw. “What do you miss? Right now?” 

It’s supremely difficult to think while Sawyer’s tongue begins to trace lazy circles right at the point where Charlie’s jaw curves up towards his ear. Somewhere in the back of his mind he wonders why Sawyer has picked him, of all people, to tease and torture like this. He feels he ought to be resisting, ought to push Sawyer away with some semblance of outrage -- but he can’t. 

Instead Charlie pulls his knees up towards his chest, wrapping his arms around his legs. Part of him doesn’t want Sawyer to stop; part of him, in fact, has perked up quite a bit at Sawyer’s ministrations, and when Sawyer’s teeth nip gently at his earlobe, Charlie nearly bites his tongue in half trying to stifle a groan. 

It’s not like he hasn’t been with men before. He’s been on his knees many a time, often in exchange for a fix, or had someone on their knees for him. But truth be told, Charlie has never much cared one way or the other about gender, but this is Sawyer,  _Sawyer_ , and… 

”Shouldn’t you be with Kate?” Charlie finally forces out.

Sawyer chuckles, his warm breath feathering the hair at the nape of Charlie’s neck. When he speaks, his lips are right against Charlie’s skin. 

”You never answered my question, hoss,” he says, “and I asked first.” With one hand he firmly pushes Charlie’s knees back down, throwing a leg across to keep them pressed flat against the sand. When Sawyer’s fingers slide up to cup the bulge in his jeans, Charlie  _does_  moan aloud, arching up into the caress. 

”Gonna answer me?” Sawyer whispers, breath hot against Charlie’s neck. “What do you miss?” 

”Nothing,” Charlie says, surprising them both.

Sawyer doesn’t answer this right away, and Charlie wonders if Sawyer has even heard him. But how in the world is he supposed to answer a question like that? How is he even supposed to think of anything other than Sawyer’s strong, sure fingers stroking him like that?

”Nothing,” Sawyer repeats. “Nothing at all? You’d rather be here? On the island?” He stops stroking Charlie through his jeans for a moment, pulling back to look at him. How odd, Charlie thinks, to see himself reflected in Sawyer’s eyes like that, flushed and breathless and wanting. 

”How’m I supposed to think?” Charlie says. Speaking is an effort, even though Sawyer’s hand is now doing nothing more than resting comfortably in Charlie’s lap. “With your hand on me like that?” 

Sawyer’s eyes twinkle with mischief. “You want me to stop?” 

”No!” Charlie gasps, too quickly, and Sawyer laughs again. But before he can form another, less desperate, thought, Sawyer has moved behind him, lightning-quick, one leg on either side of Charlie’s hips, arms around his waist to hold him fast. 

”Well, all right then,” Sawyer says, and slips his hands down to the waistband of Charlie’s jeans, unbuttoning, unzipping.

It’s better than Charlie had imagined, this inexorable stroking, and he has imagined it. He’s helpless under Sawyer’s hands, and Sawyer knows it. Charlie slumps bonelessly back against Sawyer’s chest, breathing ragged, eyes slitted nearly shut. Sawyer quickens his rhythm, and Charlie's hips buck in reflex, arching up into Sawyer’s grip. His t-shirt, worn and faded now from sea and sun, has pulled away from his collarbone, and Sawyer’s lips are fastened there, like a lamprey, sucking. 

Charlie fleetingly wonders what would happen if someone should chance to walk down to this end of the beach and find them like this, Charlie splayed wantonly across Sawyer’s lap. There are rocks between them and the main part of the beach, large ones, but hardly impassable. And suddenly he realizes that he  _can_  hear a voice, Jack’s voice, and close by the sound of it. 

But then Sawyer squeezes, and pulls just so, and every second Charlie can hear Jack’s voice drawing closer. This is what finally undoes him, and he bites his lip hard enough to draw blood to muffle the shout as he comes fiercely over Sawyer’s hand. 

”Better?” Sawyer asks, disentangling himself. There’s a water bottle nearby, half-full, and Sawyer sloshes some of it over his hand to rinse off Charlie’s spunk. He nods towards Charlie and says, “Better tuck yourself in, amigo. ‘Less you want to show off for the doc.” He grins and adds, “For all I know, maybe you do.” 

Charlie hastily tucks his softened prick back into his denims. Strangely enough, he doesfeel better somehow, and the cravings for the junk have subsided to a quiet murmur. He feels surreal, too, as though he’s just woken from the strangest of dreams. He wonders briefly if maybe he  _did_  just dream that, but he knows better. Sawyer is apart from him now, standing, and watching him with an expression that betrays nothing at all.

Jack comes around the side of the largest rock, eyes narrowing slightly as he sees them -- Sawyer leaned up against the rock, hands jammed into his pockets, scowling at the intrusion, and Charlie still sprawled on the sand, eyes glazed, cheeks flushed.

”Do I even want to know?” Jack asks as he bends down to examine Charlie’s stitches. Charlie flinches as the doctor’s fingers probe gently at his cheek. 

”Prob’ly not,” Sawyer says evenly.

In less than a second Jack is on his feet, eye to eye with Sawyer, eyes flashing with anger. “If I find out that you’re slipping him something stronger than an aspirin-“ he begins angrily.

“Easy there, doc,” Sawyer says. “You really think I’d do that? I just stopped by to see how he’s doing -- same as you.” 

”Somehow I doubt that,” Jack mutters. “How’s your cheek, Charlie?” 

Charlie starts a little at the question. “Er, it’s… Hurts, y’know, but it’s fine. I’m fine.” He finds himself unable to look Jack in the eye, sure that Jack can smell Sawyer on him.

”Stop by the caves later,” Jack says, “when you're not busy. I’ll take a better look then.” He shoots one last glance at Sawyer before heading back down the beach.

When Jack is safely out of earshot, Charlie says, “What was all that about?” 

”What?” Sawyer says, all bemused innocence. “Got what you needed, didn’t ya?’ He shifts his weight from foot to foot, and adds, “I’ll check in on you later, maybe. Us black sheep oughta stick together, don’t ya think?” And with that, he’s gone too, off down the beach, Charlie staring after him open-mouthed.

After a few minutes, Charlie struggles awkwardly to his feet and brushes the sand from his jeans. Sawyer never does anything without wanting payback, and although Charlie doesn’t know what Sawyer wants from him, at least now he knows what he can offer. 


End file.
